


Over The Edge

by orphan_account



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Bad Decisions, Blow Jobs, Bonds, Daddy Issues, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, M/M, Rape/Non-con Elements, Slow Burn, The 1980s and All Its Glory, Tony had way more fun than you as a child, Underage Drinking, Underage Sex, You Have Been Warned, but there is no instant karma so, that's sarcasm, the rape is not hand waved away, underage everything
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-26
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2018-12-20 07:23:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11915982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: From the moment he's born, Tony Stark is the center of Steve's world, light of his life, stars in his sky. And as simple as it starts out, nothing that intense can remain innocent for long.





	1. Chapter 1

May, 1970

"You shouldn't be here," Steve says, as soon as he sees Howard's damnable, salted head bobbing through the lab door. "You should be at Mass General. Why are you here?"

"I got a call," Howard says impatiently, stripping off his ever-present suit jacket and slinging it over a nearby chair. 

"Yeah, a call that your wife is in labor," Steve counters. All he's doing is sitting on the exam table, twiddling his thumbs. There's no reason for the other man to be here. "I'm waiting for some test results, not a baby."

"The baby isn't going anywhere," Howard says.

"Neither are my test results." Steve tries to give his old friend a stern look, but it's hard when he isn't wearing pants. Howard never takes him seriously when he isn't wearing pants. "Howard. It's the birth of your son--it won't happen twice."

Howard sighs and comes to lean on the table. "Steve. I told your docs not to call me unless it was urgent."

"A head the size of a baseball is about to squeeze through your wife's quarter-sized--" Steve halts before the word "vagina" leaves his mouth, remembering that he's talking about Maria, a lady he's met and had dinner with and respects the hell out of. "If anything's urgent," he fumbles, "it's that."

"It's hardly quarter sized," Howard snorts, not as held back by social restrictions as Steve. "Believe me. And anyway--"

"Only happens once, Howard."

"Will you stop taking the moral high ground?"

"You're getting defensive. Defensive means I'm right."

Howard glares at him. "I'm not just here for my friend. I'm here because it's my job."

"That's worse," Steve mutters. "That's so much worse. That makes you a workaholic."

"I'm not a workaholic."

"And now a liar."

"I'm not a--okay, I'm a liar," Howard admits. "But I'm not lying, I'm not one of those guys who's married to their job."

Steve raises his eyebrows.

"Okay, well, look at my job," his old friend says. "I have the greatest fricking job in the world. I'm the man who created Captain America--I'm practically the President."

"You're nothing close to the President," Steve says.

"Oh, sorry, did I offend your patriotic sensibilities? You're right, I'm nothing like the President because all the President does is win a popularity contest. I, on the other hand, performed a medical miracle. You know why I'm not with Maria right now? You know why I'm not oohing and ahhing over the birth of my first child? This isn't my first child--you're my first child. You are my baby, my firstborn son--"

"Is there no end to your bullshit--"

"--light of my life, the fruit of my--well, not the fruit of my loins but definitely the fruit of many long nights of research, the crowning jewel of my scientific career--"

"--you never quit--"

"--and therefore deserving of all the rights of a firstborn child," Howard completes. "And my firstborn child is sick. You don't ignore a sick child because your wife is pumping out a baby."

Steve massages his forehead. "The sad part is, I can almost follow your logic. You're almost convincing in your delusion. You've almost convinced me. And you're delusional. I can't believe you found a woman willing to marry you."

"Some women find my eccentricities charming," Howard says. "Some women enjoy my company."

"Many women do. But many women don't have to be married to you."

"Maria is a saint," the man declares. "A treasure, a gem, a being dripping with grace and poise, a goddess far better than I--and that's how I know she doesn't need me there."

"Howard--"

"She doesn't need me, she's fine."

"Howard--"

"I don't need to be there."

"Maybe she wants you there."

"She doesn't want me there, she wants a baby. She's always wanted a baby, and now she's getting one, and that's that."

"Howard, tell me you didn't have a baby just so that Maria would leave you alone."

Howard sighs. "Oh, Steve. I'm ashamed you'd think I'd stoop so low. I had a baby so that I could pass on the grand and noble legacy of the Starks--to further the human condition, to gift my DNA to the world--and _also_ so that Maria would leave me alone."

"You're a terrible human being."

"But a brilliant scientist."

Their conversation is interrupted by one of Steve's doctors, coming into the room with a manila envelope in his hands. 

"Mr. Rogers, Mr. Stark," he says in greeting, and hands Steve the test results. "Let me know if you have any questions."

"We're good," Howard says dismissively, plucking the folder from Steve's hands. He rips it open, reading it faster than Steve ever could, and frowns theatrically. "Hmm."

"Howard!"

"Just giving you the full doctor experience," Howard chuckles, and hands the sheaf of paper over. "Do you need help with the big words?"

Steve considers growling at the man, but the truth is, he can't make heads or tails of the report anyway. "Just give me the facts."

"Okay," Howard says, "Just the facts. You're perfect."

"Howard."

"I'm not dicking around," Howard insists. "You're perfect, there's nothing wrong with you--you haven't the slightest flaw."

Steve looks at him skeptically. "Why are you making that sound like a bad thing?"

"Well . . . most people have some flaws," the other man says. "Fairly regular, constant flaws, like errors in DNA copies, signs of cell aging and deterioration. And . . . you don't."

"Is that a problem?"

"How many years has it been since we met?" Howard asks, instead of answering Steve's question. 

Steve takes a second to do the math, startled by how many years he can tick off, and says, "Twenty nine."

"Twenty nine. Twenty nine years," Howard says. "I've gotten gray hair in twenty nine years--not much, but it's there. Peggy's got crow's feet--sorry, I noticed, I said it, it's reality--and you? You, Steve Rogers, paragon of humanity? In twenty nine years, you haven't had so much as a misplaced chromosome in your DNA chain. No gray hair, no wrinkles, no debilitating ailments. You're still a genetic twenty-three year old." 

"Why?" Steve doesn't pretend to follow what Howard's saying, but he believes it's true. How can he not, after all Howard's seen him through?

"No idea," Howard says. "I'm pretty sure they only picked up on that anomaly because of a recent medical journal published--we're only just beginning to dive into aging and its causes, so--and I hate to say this, but--they could also be wrong. You could be aging but slowly; or not at all; or in a way that we can't classify." He shrugs. "It's a toss-up."

Steve frowns. "What does that mean for me?"

Howard gives him a long look. "Nothing's changed. You're still a man who signed up for an experiment. Maybe you thought--and maybe _I_ thought--it would end after you took the serum, but that's not the case. It's still an experiment. All we can do is observe."

Steve slides off the table, reaching for his pants, ready to start in on how this isn't what he signed up for, though the damage's been done now, when another doctor rushes into the room.

"Mr. Stark, sir," he says, "there was a call from Mass General--you need to go there now."

~

 

Steve stares down at the bundle wrapped in blue and white flannel. There's a baby in there, somewhere, under the hat and mittens and star-spangled blanket (someone had a sense of humor on that one, he thinks). 

He's not doing anything in particular, just standing over one bassinet in a row of a dozen, in the middle of the nursery because he couldn't stand waiting outside the operating room for a minute longer, and Howard hasn't asked to see his son, not once. 

Steve's making a lot of excuses for his friend--stress, fatigue, desire to stay close to Maria--but he knows the truth. Howard's not coming for this baby because Howard didn't want a baby, and Maria wanted him but now she's losing blood, and Steve would give every one of his perfect cells to repair hers but it doesn't work that way and there's nothing he can do, so he's here. 

What a legacy to be born into. 

"You can hold him, if you like," a nurse says in passing, arms full of towels and johnnies, "they like it when you hold them."

"Oh, I'm not the--" he begins, turning; but the nurse is already gone. "I'm not the father," he finishes, for his own sake. No one seems to care. 

So he reaches down, carefully wrapping his hands around the baby--they're so big, they never felt big before, but with this . . . with a boy in his hands, they feel entirely oversized--and lifting him. His first thought is less words and more pangs of terror that he'll drop Howard's child. He cradles the baby in both arms, and pretends he isn't shaking.

"I'm terrified I'll crush you," he admits, though the baby is fast asleep. He was expecting more wailing, honestly; for the baby to wake up and start crying once Steve touched him, instinctively knowing that Steve has no right to hold him first. 

The little thing is gumming one fist, jaw working in his sleep. Around his wrist is a tiny, laminated tag with his gender, Howard's name, and another--Anthony. 

"Did they name you already?" Steve asks, aware that he's talking to a sleeping baby as if it--him--will answer. "Are you Anthony? Are you my little Tony?"

His voice has gone quiet and hushed, his shoulders hunching, his whole body curving in around Anthony. He shifts so that he's holding the baby in one arm, and sheltering him with his other. He can feel something growing in his heart, expanding through his chest. 

The baby's impossibly small eyelids flutter, and ease open. His eyes are the dark, grayish-blue of most newborns, and he squints blearily at Steve as if unsure of his surroundings. 

Steve's throat closes up, and for a moment, he can't breathe. Tony seems to have doubled in weight, becoming a suffocating force against Steve's chest. He's just so--so tiny, and his fingers, and he's been alive in this world for such a small amount of time, and here he is, entrusted to Steve. 

When Steve was ten, his father drank himself to death; when he was eighteen, Ma got consumption. When he was twenty-one, his best friend boarded a helicopter and never got off. And since 1941, when he signed up to an experimental, untested, completely dark program, he's lost more than he can keep track of. 

But he's never cried; not in public. Maybe at night, but no one counts that. 

Yet right now, even though he's in a hospital with nurses and new parents and press around, even though this isn't his child and he's got no business being here anyway, right now his eyes burn with a familiar, old sensation, and suddenly he's crying. 

He lays his forehead against tiny Tony's, breathing in the just-washed scent that can't quite mask the metallic sting of blood underneath. 

"My little man," he whispers.

He's in love.


	2. August 1984

Through the tiny window above his kitchen sink, Steve can see Tony sitting on the sidewalk, slurping a Popsicle and trading insults with the boy next door. His narrow, bony limbs stick out awkwardly from his striped tank top and belted shorts; he's been growing like a weed, Maria says, and whenever she turns around he seems to have changed sizes again. 

Steve remembers that stage, but his lanky body never solidified into a man's; not like Tony's will. It took a magic potion and a mad scientist for Steve to finally leave puberty.

He smiles, grateful that--in part because of him--Tony won't have to go through the sad excuse of a childhood that he had. Things are so much better now. The world's open to Tony--it's everything Steve ever dreamed of. 

He goes to the screen door and raps on the wood, calling, "Don't forget to pack up before this afternoon, champ."

Tony twists around, scowling in Steve's direction, brown eyes dark with annoyance. "I don't want to," he says.

"That's nice," Steve says amicably back. "I don't want to pay my rent, but that doesn't mean I can get away with it."

"Steve," Tony whines.

"Tony," Steve whines right back. "Pack. Howard's expecting you home tonight."

Tony mutters something that Steve doesn't catch. He can guess, though.

"Come here," he orders.

The fourteen-year-old makes a rude gesture that he definitely didn't learn here, but he gets to his feet anyway, chucking his Popsicle stick away. He stands on the other side of the screen, pressing his nose to the wire. Steve can feel the heat from his body.

"What?" Tony asks, sullen. "I don't want to go, and he doesn't want me--"

"He wants you," Steve cuts him off. "He doesn't realize it, but this time is valuable for both of you--"

Tony yanks open the door, cutting him off, and shoves by, still scowling. "It's a fucking waste of time."

"Language," Steve scolds. 

Tony rolls his eyes. He stomps down the hall, past rows of framed school pictures and progressively better design schematics, and tears into his room.

When Tony was a baby, Steve bought this apartment with a vague notion that he might be babysitting occasionally; after the first night with the infant, he converted the second, larger bedroom into a nursery. The light gray walls have stayed the same, but everything else has changed and grown with the boy.

Steve would never admit it, but sometimes he sleeps here when Tony's gone. 

Tony starts throwing things in his overnight bag; books that Steve's given up on trying to understand, notebooks full of his chicken-scratch writing, magazines on cars and finance and space exploration. Steve can't remember the last time he saw a toy in the kid's hands. 

"Tony--" he begins.

"I don't get it!" Tony bursts out, as if this was the cue he was waiting for. He spins around, letting the bag fall to the floor with a bang. "I don't get why you make me go back there! I hate it!"

"Because he's your father," Steve says, baffled. The idea of Tony staying here permanently never occurred to him; it's not an option, and he would have thought Tony would understand that. "And it's your home."

"You're an idiot!" Tony spits out, and Steve backs up, eyes widening.

Tony's always had a sharp tongue. He started speaking before he was two, and his verbal skills progressed faster than Steve could keep track of. He learned sarcasm--he learned that it made people laugh, and leave him alone, and listen. He learned that sounding smart was more important than actually being smart. Steve thinks of words as Tony's superpower.

He never thought he'd be a victim of it. 

"I hate it there! I hate it, I hate it, I hate it!" Tony is screaming. 

Steve's focusing on strange things, like the reddening zit on Tony's right cheek, and the battered cover of the textbook on the floor, and the greasy slick of Tony's unwashed hair in the light coming through the window. He's trying to remember that being an adolescent is hard, that it was hard for him, and he's battling the hurt that Tony's words are causing and it's a losing battle. 

He takes a deep, deep breath and reminds himself that he's commanded an army before. He's fought things too terrible for nightmares to paint. A teenage meltdown should be nothing.

"I'm going to stand outside this door," he says slowly, "until you're ready to use that big vocabulary of yours to tell me what's really going on. And I might not be as smart as you or your father, but that does not make it okay to call me an idiot."

He closes the door behind him.

Breathes. 

They've gone through the same routine every Sunday afternoon since the boy was three weeks old. This isn't a new thing that Tony has to do; it isn't even that difficult. He's never acted like this before. 

He's never called Steve an _idiot_.

A second later, the door opens. Tony's eyes are red-rimmed, and he determinedly doesn't look at Steve as he hauls his bag out of the room. 

"Tony, what's going--"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"But--"

"Just shut up."

Steve grits his teeth. "I don't even get an apology?"

"Sorry," Tony tosses over his shoulder, dragging the bag down the hall. 

"A real apology."

"That isn't fucking enough for you?"

Steve slams his fist against the wall, not hard enough to do real damage, just to make Tony jump. "Enough swearing. Enough attitude," he commands, somehow feeling less in control of this boy than he was of an entire army. 

"Don't tell me what to do," Tony snaps. "You aren't my father."

"I asked you to do one thing and you threw a fit," Steve shoots back. "You don't think I deserve a little--"

"I told you," Tony hisses. "I don't want to go back there!"

"Too bad--it's your home!"

" _This_ is my home!" Tony screams, loud enough that his voice breaks. 

He gestures around, to the pictures on the wall and the art projects taped to the fridge; to his old set of child dishes, still in the glass cupboard, and his report card on the counter, waiting for Steve, not Howard or Maria, to sign.

"This is where I keep my stuff and where I come when I'm having a bad day or when I need advice and this is where I celebrate my birthday and Christmas and your birthday and everything that matters and _this_ is home and you don't realize that and that's why you're an idiot."

"Tony--I'm not your father," Steve tries, doing his best to not be moved by the words. He feels like his heart is melting a little bit, though. He didn't know Tony thought like that.

"Funny, I think I mentioned that."

"I'm not your father, this isn't your home--"

"Non sequiter, does not follow, logic doesn't compute--"

"Tony--"

"When?" Tony demands, letting go of his bag. He throws his arms wide and raises his eyebrows. "When do I not have to go back? Sixteen? Eighteen? Twenty? When do I get to choose to stay here instead of going back to that--that--that place?"

"It isn't a choice!" Steve argues. "This isn't an option, or a choice, or anything, it's--"

"When am I old enough to decide?!" Tony snaps over him. "I'm not a fucking kid, Steve. I know the difference between a home and a hell."

"Exaggerating won't help you here."

Tony lets out a wordless scream, hands bending into claws. "You don't get it!" he shrieks. 

"What don't I get?" Steve snarls. "Besides the reasoning behind this temper tantrum?"

Tony throws himself onto the couch and crosses his arms, lips sealed.

"Seriously?" Steve demands. 

Tony turns his head away. 

Steve doesn't have time for this. He bangs around, looking for something to make for dinner, too out of sorts to concentrate. His mind keeps whirling around, trying to figure out what he did wrong, what made Tony so upset. He comes up with nothing. 

He stews for the better part of an hour, doing little more than rearrange cans in the kitchen, sneaking glances at Tony's dark head. Even when the kid was two and three, and going through the age of fits, he never felt this frustrated. At least back then he knew what Tony _wanted_. 

Finally, he bangs a can of corn onto the counter, decides on enchiladas, and says, in his calmest voice, "Tony."

The boy's head twitches.

"Tony, you can't stay here. Do you know why you can't stay here?" Steve doesn't give him time to answer.  
"Because you're my best friend's son, and you belong to him, not me. You can't stay because tomorrow at eight a.m. you have to be at a boarding school in Massachusetts for freshman orientation. You can't stay because I make a little under two hundred bucks a week as a government employee and that doesn't pay the bill of that boarding school which you need to go to, because you're smart and going places and probably going to invent a cure for cancer or an elevator to the moon and I can't help you with that. Howard can. And he's your _father_ , and that's important, whether you realize it or not."

Tony pulls his legs up, hugging his knees.

"You can't stay because there's a proper order to the world, and in that order, boys stay with their fathers. You can't stay because the job I do is dangerous, and has terrible hours, and you don't know the half of it. You can't stay because--"

"I know why I can't!" Tony snaps. His voice cracks. "But I want to."

Steve's irritation drains away with four words. He falls onto the couch next to Tony, the dangerous sentence-- _I want you to, too_ \--sitting on his tongue. He bites it back. 

"I'm always going to be here," he promises instead. "As bad as the week might feel, you'll always be back here for the weekend."

"Not once school starts," Tony mumbles. "I'll never see you if I'm in Massachusetts. Why did Dad make me go to a stupid boarding school anyway?" 

"Because you're--"

"I don't want to be smart. I want to be dumb and stay in New York and work at the docks and sit on your front step with the rest of the guys," Tony says. "I want to live here and go into the army and be a hero and then come back to Brooklyn."

Steve puts a hand on his shoulder. "You don't," he says.

"Don't tell me what I want."

"You don't want that, Tony. That was the life I had. You're better than that."

"I don't want to be."

"Well, I wanted to be you," Steve snaps. "I wanted to go to college, you know. I dreamed of getting a chance to work for the opportunities you're being handed on a plate. I wanted more than Red Hook, Tony, but the only way out I had was through the Program. You're lucky--you don't have to take a drug to get ahead in life. And you're going to take advantage of all your opportunities, dammit, or I'll tan your hide."

He grabs Tony's face and yanks it around to his. "Do you understand?"

Tony scowls. "You sound like Dad."

Steve lays his forehead on the boy's. "Tony. Tell me you understand."

"Everything's going to change," Tony whispers instead. "I'm . . ." He bites his lip, and suddenly Steve gets it. Tony's scared. He should have seen that before. 

He wraps the boy in a hug, wishing he could squeeze tightly enough to scare the worry away. "I'm scared," he says, before Tony can. "I'm scared you're going to grow up and forget about this old man, and never come back. But I'm not going to let my fear stop your future--you can't, either."

Tony grabs him, hugging back fiercely. "I won't forget about you," he says fervently. 

The words--the pitch of the words--the intensity makes Steve's stomach swoop, and he blinks in surprise. The tug in his abdomen is familiar, but out of context, happening when it has no business happening. 

He squeezes Tony tightly, then lets go, ignoring the twinge.

"Help me with dinner?" he suggests, ruffling Tony's hair.

Tony pulls an annoyed face, and Steve fights to cement the image in his brain. _This is Tony at fourteen. This is Tony before he grows up. This is Tony before he knows_.

Tony squints at him. "You're staring. It's revolting."

Steve hands him a can of corn. "Open this and be quiet."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Wow! Maybe I'm easily impressed, but I was SO surprised at the hits this has gotten . . . Thanks everyone! I hope you keep following my crazy headcanon._


	3. January 1985

Howard brings Steve a scotch to celebrate the New Year, and they stand outside, Howard blowing smoke into the frigid early morning. 

"You should go to that appointment," Howard says. 

Steve shakes his head. "I don't need another doctor telling me something I already know."

"You never know, they're making new discoveries every day--"

"Howard." Steve turns on him. "If there was a doctor on Earth who could undo what's been done to me, you would know about it. I would know about it. My enemies would know about it. And it would be done already."

"But, the nonaging--"

"Everything has a price," Steve cuts him off. "This is my pound of flesh, Howard. Trying to fix it would just result in another price, and another, and I'd spent my whole life running from the consequences of my actions instead of just suffering this simple one."

"It's not simple, you could just drop dead at any--"

"I'm done discussing this." Steve downs the useless scotch. "Happy New Year. Nat wanted me to give you a message."

"Oh, now you're delivering threats for the Widow?" Howard asks.

"She hates it when you call her that."

"Which is exactly why I call her that. What does she want?" Howard pours himself another drink. 

"Shut down the ant men project," Steve says. "In fact, she wants you to stop all research surrounding genetic enhancement."

Howard snorts. "And throw away my entire career? The government has me on retainer, Rogers. What does she expect from me?"

"You're smart. She expects you to find another field to dive into," Steve replies. "I'm just the messenger, Howard. You know how this works."

"It still amazes me that she thinks she can tell me what to do."

"It's a friendly warning." Steve crosses his arms. "She was serious. I could tell."

"Did she give you a reason?"

He shakes his head.

Howard heaves a sigh. "Then tell her she can go to--"

"I'm not saying that, she's a lady."

"I don't care if she's the Red Skull himself, I'm not going to stop my most lucrative project just because she says so," the other man says. He toasts Steve. "Capiche?"

Steve frowns. "I can't protect you if she decides--"

"Let me make my own decisions." Howard claps him on the shoulder. "Eh, son?"

"Don't."

Howard grins, and kisses him on the cheek. "Happy New Year, Steve." He waits a few seconds, and adds, "Light of my life, my joy, my pride--"

"Stop." 

Steve tries not to smile, but he doesn't stand a chance.

 

Steve catches sight of his own face in the mirror above Howard's desk--it's white, ugly with anger, nothing like the reflection he's used to--and it throws him. He whips around, facing Tony instead of his own self, and demands, "Is this what you've been learning at school?"

Tony, still slumped on the floor from where Steve tossed him, raises the amber bottle in his hand for a toast. His typically messy hair is slicked back now, held in place with gel; instead of the polo shirt and chinos Maria usually wrestles him in, he's wearing black jeans and a white t-shirt. Even from the floor, Steve can tell he's gotten taller. 

"What on earth are you thinking?" Steve tries to grab the bottle from Tony. "This is your father's party--"

"You mean, _your_ father?" Tony counters, evading his grab despite being obviously tipsy. "Yeah, I heard that touching little exchange outside. Always thought Dad didn't want a son." He glares. "Turns out he just didn't want the wrong son."

"Tony--"

"Oh, will you just admit that he doesn't want me?" Tony interrupts. "It's never been about not wanting a son, it's just about not wanting me, me specifically! There's something--" He stops, stammers, frustrated, his face growing redder and redder as the words fail to come. "There's something wrong with me."

"Tony!" Steve snaps, seizing his shoulders, ignoring the bottle as it shatters on the floor. "Listen to me--there is nothing-- _nothing_ \--wrong with you! There's never been anything wrong with you!"

"THEN WHY DOES HE LOVE YOU AND NOT ME?!" Tony screams, flinging the question into Steve's face like a smoke bomb. His spit flecks Steve's face, and Steve flinches like it's shrapnel. Somehow, this feels harder than a war. "Why does he call you his light, and let his eyes glaze over when he's talking to me? Why aren't I enough?!"

Steve lets Tony go. 

"I don't know," he admits. "I really don't know, Tony." He doesn't bother to deny the accusation. "He's a brilliant man, but that doesn't make him perfect . . . no one is perfect."

"Except you," Tony grumbles. "God knows I have to hear about how perfect you are on the daily."

"I'm not--"

"You fucking are, in Howard's eyes at least," Tony says. "Steve Rogers can do no wrong, and me? I built my first circuit board when I was four, and all he had to say was that the cut was sloppy. The _cut_ , Rogers."

Steve's fuzzy on the--okay, he has no idea how to build a circuit board--but he can guess by Tony's reaction that Howard's response was inadequate, given the situation. 

"I'm sorry," he says. "I'm sorry he's not a good father, I'm sorry there's nothing I can do about it, I'm sorry . . ." he falters. 

Because there's something he can do about it, and he knows what it is, and Tony knows what it is, and it's the one thing Steve can't deliver.

"You're his child," he says softly, reaching out to touch the back of Tony's hand. "Bucko, you're his child and I can't do that to him. I can't take you away." 

Tony twists his fingers around, lacing their hands together. "Steve," he says, and Steve can hear the plea. 

_You're a hero. You're supposed to save people. Save me._

Steve wrenches his hand away and stands up. "C'mon," he says, beckoning for Tony to stand as well. "You've had a few too many, I think--doesn't reflect well on your parents. Let's get you into a limo before that drink starts coming back up."

"Steve."

Steve forces himself to turn away, to look at the door. "No arguments, soldier. We all have our crosses to bear."

He can't take Tony from Howard. As much as he loves the boy, he can't do that to his oldest friend. 

Coiled like a waiting snake, the memories of Bucky start to nip at the edges of Steve's brain. 

His perfect life begins to unravel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _You guys are the be~est!_


	4. April 1985

Steve opens his eyes to the rush of waves and the crest of warm air over his bare chest, and sighs. 

Howard calls this vacation, but for Steve, it's internment. He can't keep his mind off work; despite Howard's insistence that SHIELD can do without him for a few weeks, Steve's too used to his life revolving around the spy organization. With Peggy resigning as Director in three short months, there's a lot that still needs to be done--loose ends she doesn't want her successor finding and tugging on, unraveling her years of work. Steve's been tying those ends up for the better part of a month, now, and it's hard to get out of that mindset.

The Malibu house is nice, of course; Steve gets his own bedroom, with a view overlooking the beach. Drinks are free and every room has a bowl of tiny, rose-shaped chocolates, but honestly? He misses barracks. He misses tents in the French countryside. He misses his cramped Brooklyn apartment with its tiny windowboxes and clanking pipes. 

He's taking naps, for crying out loud. He's sleeping for no other purpose than to sleep. 

Steve Rogers doesn't do vacations. They make him restless. 

He stretches, noticing that the sun is beginning to set. It's probably about time for him to get ready for dinner, a five-course affair in the outdoor lounge.

A rustling on his balcony has him jerking upright, body instantly tense, too ready for an imagined conflict. Oh, what he'd give for a fight right now. Nothing more relaxing than decking a couple of kidnapper-wannabes or would-be robbers; that's his idea of a good time.

The noise, however, is just Tony. 

Steve gets up and pads through the French doors, noticing a cigarette dangling from Tony's lips as he comes to stand next to the boy. 

"Does Howard know that you smoke?" he asks disapprovingly. 

"Howard doesn't care what I do," Tony replies, but he snubs the butt out on the railing. "Don't tell Mom, though."

Steve sighs. "Tony . . ." Since their fight on New Year's Day, he's found the boy unmanageable at best. It's as if someone flipped a switch in his brain and turned him from a sweet, intelligent kid into a moody halfling.

Tony raises his eyebrows over his heart-shaped sunglasses, daring Steve to behavior-check him. "What?"

Steve bites his tongue, wary of Tony's mercurial temper. "Never mind." Pause. "Are you doing okay, champ?"

Tony shrugs, looking out over the ocean. "Fine." His face, in profile, is set in hard, unfamiliar lines. Steve doesn't recognize his jawline; it's squared off, become more manly. The sun touches his forehead and the bridge of his nose with a golden glow; he's almost a stranger.

"Is that all?" Steve leans on the metal balcony, searching for a hint of the kid he knew not so long ago, hoping he'll find the right combination of words to jab that kid back into existence--even though he knows full well that school has changed Tony, and probably for good.

"What do you want from me?" the boy snaps. "A mission report?"

"Maybe a change in attitude," Steve suggests. "I'm just trying to have a conversation, here. To talk, like we used to."

"I'm fine," Tony says shortly. 

"That's a lie," Steve replies. "I know you, Tony--you think I can't tell when something's up?"

"It's none of your business, then."

Steve resists the urge to scream in frustration. Instead, he clutches the balcony railing hard enough to bend it. "You're my business. You always have been."

"You aren't my father."

"Your father doesn't care. I do," Steve snaps, and instantly regrets it. 

Tony's face crumples. 

"Wait--" Steve starts.

"Hell of a time to stop towing the party line," the boy mumbles. "You're supposed to tell me he loves me but he's just busy."

"I'm not going to lie," Steve says, and puts his arm around Tony's shoulders. "But I'm sorry. That was harsh--I didn't mean to--It's just that, I'm looking out for you, okay?"

Tony shakes him off. "By doing a half-assed, fucked up job?" he demands. "By sort of being there for me on the weekends but backing off when I ask you to take real responsibility? You keep chanting that you aren't my father, but then you go and act like you are! Not cool."

"I'm doing the best I can!"

"It's not good enough!" Tony shoves him, scowling. " _You_ aren't good enough!"

Anger ripples through Steve like a current, prickling all of his softest spots. He shoves Tony right back, pushing him against the railing, mindful of his own strength but not about to let the kid get away with hitting him. "Too fucking bad!" he snaps. "I'm all you have!" 

"Fuck you!"

"Don't talk to me like that."

"Don't tell me what to do!" Tony seizes his shirt--probably just a defensive gesture, but one that awakens demons Steve hasn't had to face in a long time. 

He's too aware of his body, pressing unconsciously against Tony's, sandwiching him between Steve and the railing.

He steps away quickly, shaking those ghosts out of his head. Bucky rears up in his mind, hissing dire warnings in the remembered darkness of a military-issued tent, and for a second Steve isn't seeing the Malibu beach, he's seeing the sharp planes of Bucky's face, thrown into relief by the lantern dangling from a tent pole. 

This isn't the war--

Steve takes another step back. "Tony--" he says, shaky. 

Tony whips off his sunglasses. "The fuck's up with you?" he demands.

"Don't throw your childhood away," Steve tells him. "I fought so you could have a better life. So that you wouldn't be like me. So don't . . . so just stop this, whatever it is, please. Go back to being happy."

_Don't turn me into Bucky_ , he wants to say, but that won't make sense to Tony. Tony doesn't know about Bucky, or Steve, or the parts of 1942 that Steve's omitted from his TV interviews. Tony's just a fourteen-year-old kid and that's hard enough without having to deal with Steve's problems, too. 

Tony's staring at him like he's crazy. "You think I can flip a switch and just stop?" he asks, disgusted. "You think it's that fucking simple? You think I want to feel like this, act like this?"

"You're in control of your--"

"I don't control jack shit!" Tony suddenly screams. He shoves Steve again, apparently reduced to base physical reactions to communicate. "I have no control, Rogers, none! I can't do anything!!"

"Bullshit!" Steve snaps. "Don't give me excuses like that, soldier."

"I'm not a SOLDIER! I'm just a kid!"

"Well, we agree on one thing at least!" Steve seizes Tony's shoulders again and shakes him. "You're just a kid, so shut up about things you don't understand!"

"JUST ADOPT ME ALREADY!" 

Steve can pick out the individual flecks of red and topaz in Tony's brown eyes; the pockmarks in his skin; the beginnings of a stubby mustache. He can feel Tony breathing in the space between them, make out the subtle traces of doubt and fear as Tony tries to gauge his reaction. The word neither of them ever wanted to use-- _adopt_ \--floats there, taunting Steve. 

"I can't fucking adopt you," he says, and kisses him. 

He doesn't think about it beforehand--all of a sudden he's just doing it, he's slamming his lips into Tony's, like he had been trying to think of the most damaging thing possible to do and this is what he came up with. And maybe that's exactly what happened. 

His nose presses awkwardly into Tony's cheek, and he shifts his head to correct the angle, and his mouth opens on reflex, brushing Tony's dry lower lip. 

His stomach burns in an immediate and violent reaction, liquid fire flowing into his abdomen at the slight touch. How could he have not realized? How could he have not seen?

Dark hair, skinny body, and those dark, dark eyes. 

_Fuck you_ , Bucky sneers in the back of his mind, and Steve tears away from Tony, horrified.

Just as shocked, just as mortified, Tony stares back. Behind him, the sun has set. The beach is dark. 

"It's . . . time for supper . . ." Steve says shakily, retreating through the French doors. "I'm going to change . . . you should, too."

He goes to his dresser, mechanically taking his clothes from the drawer with shaking hands. He hardly pays attention to what he chooses--just something, just anything--and flees to the bathroom, convincing himself he isn't hiding. He's making a tactical retreat.

The arousal is tearing through him like a bullet, setting all these tiny memories ablaze--Tony's slim shoulders in that tank, the last day he was in Brooklyn--his always terrible hair, now tamed with gel--the cocky expression on his face when Steve found him with a bottle of liquor on New Year's Eve--those stupid sunglasses. 

Tony, just now on the balcony, in his white t-shirt and Jams, pack of cigarettes stuffed in his waistband. 

Steve grips the sink, and forces safer images in his head--Tony, just a few hours old, wrapped in a striped blanket. Learning to talk, learning to walk. His first word was--Steve strains to remember--banana? Or just nana? 

Someone knocks on the bathroom door. Steve doesn't need to ask who. 

"Go away," he calls. 

"Fine," Tony says. "But I didn't hate it. Just so you know."

Steve tears his gaze from his hands long enough to see his face--to see his terrible, twisted, demented face rent with desire and disgust. What is the matter with him?

He's out of the bathroom before Tony reaches the suite door--his monstrous hands are reaching out, slamming Tony into the frame--Tony lunges at him, and their lips lock. Tony's hands thrust through his hair, stroke the back of his neck; he's clumsy for a second, floundering under Steve's touch, but he learns quickly, oh, he learns. 

Steve is damned, Steve is so damned, Steve knows that he's damned and he drags Tony down with him, tossing him onto the bed like a rag doll--that face, that face that isn't mocking him any more but that looks as though the whole world rests between Steve's shoulders--the little gasp Tony makes when Steve hitches up his shirt; Steve trails his lips down Tony's jaw to his neck, gently sucking on his Adam's apple. 

It isn't gorgeous, or savory like a long meal, or sparking with little moments of quiet joy--it's fast, hard, no thinking, no waiting--Steve grabs Tony's hips, encouraging him to grind against his thigh-- "C'mon," he whispers. "Cum, cum, cum--"

Tony digs his fingers into Steve's neck and kisses him again, sloppy, salty, hips bucking as he half-cries with need. "Stop--" he chokes out, and then, "Don't stop." 

Steve noses his way down Tony's chest, kissing his sternum, swirling his tongue around Tony's nipples, feeling his rib cage heave up and down with the boy's breath. He yanks Tony's shorts down, too rushed to take them all the way off, and palms him through his underwear.

"I--I--I--" Tony stammers.

"What?" Steve murmurs, and opens his mouth over Tony's stomach, nipping the skin, mouthing down to his hip bones and back up again, jerking Tony's hips once more, steadily pumping his thigh against Tony's growing hard-on. It's been so long since he's done this . . . he missed it. 

He missed the lithe body trembling under him, the uncontrolled thrusting of Tony's frustrated libido, God, boys are so impatient, so full of desire, overflowing with these suppressed urges--

His own dick is throbbing, begging him to pay attention to it, and he obliges, reaching down to unzip his jeans. Tony beats him there, smaller hands fumbling for a grip, and Steve's breath hitches. 

"This," Tony says, practically snarls, sliding his hand back and forth in a perfunctory way. He arches his back as Steve presses his body closer, their bodies rocking in unison now. 

Tony kisses Steve's neck, mimicking Steve's gesture from earlier, his hand still rubbing the underside of Steve's dick.

Steve thrusts into his hand, ignoring the slowly building sense of chafing skin in favor of immediate gratification, and Tony's own humping becomes more manic, faster and faster, his body shivering and bucking and pumping against Steve's, his breath catching then stopping altogether for a second, and he cums first and it's like an explosion. 

The wet, pulsing cock against the inside of Steve's thigh, twitching as Tony moans his way down, just serves to turn him on more, and he crushes Tony's body into the bed, hands on either side of Tony's head, grinding ceaselessly against the boy's hand as his head fills with the sight of Tony, spent and lush and staring at him with those damn dark eyes, waiting for him to cum, watching him cum--

Steve bites his own lip hard enough to draw blood, feeling the fire build as Tony, in a stroke of inspiration, lightly traces a thumb over the head of his dick. 

"Aa-- _ah_ \--" Steve chokes out, and cums hard, not as abundantly as Tony but with more fist clenching, sheet-ripping, and incriminating noises. The burning sensation builds to an unbearable level, more addictive than a drug, before slowly leaking away, juddering off into comfortable numbness. 

Steve throws his head back, taking his first breath in what feels like forever. "Oh, God," he groans, still shuddering down from the high. His heart is pounding hard enough for him to feel it through ribs and skin, and he wants to fall back on the bed and sleep, and forget what just happened, or maybe dream about it; he's not sure. 

Tony's already wrestling his underwear back up, wet cock and all, matter-of-factly shimmying back into his pants and getting to his feet. 

"I--" Steve starts, reality bleeding back in. 

Tony's _fourteen_. 

"It's time for dinner," Tony says, not looking at him. "You said. I think I'd better change after this." He laughs, the first sign of happiness Steve's gotten from him in months, and heads for the door. "And you need a shower, Rogers. You stink."

Adrenaline and dopamine still coursing through his body, warring with the guilt he knows he's supposed to feel, Steve doesn't answer. He sits on the bed in absolute shock, still shaking, the horror of what he's just done dawning on him far too slowly. 

Bucky's smile flits into his head.

_Told you you'd grow up to be like me, kid._

 

Steve is twitchy through dinner, gaze focused on the tiki torches instead of Tony's face. He doesn't sleep, tossing in bed with the balcony doors still wide open. He comes to breakfast feeling like a drowned man, lungs clogged, eyes crusted, limbs stiff. His head aches. He can't rationalize his way out of the labyrinth he stumbled into; his own actions feel like that of another man.

But no. It was all him.

The sandstone dining pavilion looks different when the sun is out, shining through its tall pillars, and the ocean is blue and bright, the light is gold, and it's all so perfect that Steve feels soiled by comparison. 

Tony's sitting at the long table, kicking his bare feet idly and reading the newspaper. His sleeveless sweatshirt is unzipped over his bare chest; Steve averts his eyes before they reach the tanned strip of skin above Tony's waistband and grabs the funny pages, sitting on the other side of the table.

"Morning," Tony mumbles. He picks up the bottle of rum on the drink caddy and pours it into his half-full coffee mug, then offers it to Steve, who refuses. As much as he'd like a stiff drink, it wouldn't do him a lick of good.

He reaches for the smoothie pitcher instead, asking, "Where are your parents?"

"Mom went for a swim, and Howard's having a lie-in," Tony replies. He turns a page in the paper, yawning. If yesterday affected him in any way, he's doing a bang-up job of hiding it.

Steve frowns. "That doesn't sound like him."

"He's with one of the maids," Tony says dispassionately. "I'd expect that has something to do with it."

Steve sets the pitcher down with a clunk. "What?"

"Pretty sure they're having sex. But it doesn't matter--Mom's been sleeping in another room for a year now."

Steve stares at him. "Why didn't I know this?"

The boy shrugs, and flips the newspaper over. "Apparently there's a virus that causes that gay disease. Bet you didn't know that either."

"Tony."

"Steve." Tony looks up long enough to shoot him a glare. "Just leave it alone, okay? It's just something that's going on, and I don't need to talk about it, don't need you to try and fix it, don't need anything except for you to sit here and shut up and have breakfast with me like a normal family."

Steve runs a finger over the condensation on his glass, trying to process the news that Howard is sleeping with a woman who isn't his wife. If he's totally honest with himself, it's not that surprising; but to Tony . . . to Tony, it must be devastating, for all he pretends otherwise. 

He feels even worse than before. 

"Fine," he says, his conscience throbbing like a stubbed toe. "Want to play table tennis after this?"

Tony drinks his coffee. "Sure. Why not."

 

The rest of the week, Steve tries not to think about the . . . incident. Tony doesn't mention it, so Steve figures as long as he doesn't bring it up, it'll be fine.

It'll be fine.

He repeats the lie so often, he starts to believe it. They pretend everything is fine, he and Tony, and go swimming and play games and sometimes Maria or Howard join them, but never at the same time, and they all eat dinner together like a family and Steve wishes he was back at work. 

The night before they leave, Tony asks Steve to come down to the beach with him. 

"It's dark," Steve says.

"Please," Tony says.

They go.

Tony holds Steve's hand, something he hasn't done since he was six, and when Steve asks him how school is going, he says, "I hate it," instead of telling Steve to fuck off.

"Why do you hate it?"

"Because it's a fucking boarding school," Tony shoots back, and clams up. Steve squeezes his hand, Tony's bony knuckles rolling over his palm.

"I'm sorry."

"You should be."

Guilt jabs at Steve--he should be used to it by now, but he's not. He feels just as queasy as the first time. 

He shouldn't be around Tony. They shouldn't be alone. And if Howard knew what happened . . . shame curdles in Steve's stomach. He can only imagine what Maria might say.

Tony pulls at his hand. "Steve. Steve, I'm okay."

He stares at Tony in disbelief. How can he be?

"It's okay," Tony says, and Steve hears his own voice, many years younger, ringing through the words. 

He doesn't know what to do, if he can believe the strength projected in Tony's gaze. He used to pretend it was okay, too. But Tony's looking at him like he used to, and talking with him like he used to, and Steve's always been a sucker for the needy expression Tony's so good at wearing.

"Come to my open house," Tony says. "Mom's busy and Dad doesn't care."

"Okay," Steve agrees, feeling as though he's drowning.

"Kiss me," Tony says.

Steve agrees to that, too. Tony's lips are clammy, and he has to stop himself from taking more, from pushing Tony into the sand and devouring him right here.

There's something so very wrong with Steve.

They walk the beach in silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _OMG . . . *hides behind desk, wildly blushing* . . . this is the first time I've published actual smut and I just felt like I had to share that with you guys because I'm so embarrassed right now asdfghjkl I hope you liked it! Is that the right thing to say? I have no idea. Forgive my rambling. See you next chapter! Steve's going to school! And RHODEY appears . . . !!_


	5. June 1985

Steve's palms are sweaty as he gets out of the taxi, and he tips the driver absently, giving him a twenty instead of a five. He waves away the man's attempt to correct the mistake and grabs his bag from the trunk, motioning the driver away.

The past two months have been an agonizing cycle of anticipation and dread, compounded by his guilt and fear--a toxic mix of emotions he should be used to by now, but isn't.

"Rogers?"

The familiar voice is the icing on the cake, and Steve's stomach lurches as he turns around, disbelieving. "Gabe?"

Older, slightly smaller than Steve remembers, with an impressive beard but still religiously keeping a shaved head, Gabe Jones grins at him, shaking his head back and forth as if he can't believe it. "What are you doing here?" he asks. "It's been, what, ten years?"

"At least." Steve recovers himself and goes for a handshake, clapping the other man on the back. Gabe's hardly fresh-faced and eighteen anymore; that makes him feel old. Especially considering what's been bothering him lately.

"You stopped coming to the meetings," Gabe says, still grinning. "Too good for the likes of us now?"

"Joined up with SHIELD," Steve tells him. "Peggy did good things with the organization, Gabe--you'd be proud to stand with her."

Gabe laughs. "If I were able to," he replies. "But not all of us are forever young." He looks Steve up and down. "Not a day over twenty-five, if that," he whistles. "Still can't believe it. Sure, I read the tabloids, but you know those things . . . full of bullshit. Seein' it with my own eyes though . . ."

"It's not all it's cracked up to be," Steve assures him. "So, what's up with you? What're you doing here?" He glances at the private school. "Brushing up on your education?"

"Nah, Howard's was enough for me," Gabe says. "I'm here for my son."

"Nicky?" Steve squints at him. "He's that old already?"  
"Sixteen next month," his old friend confirms. "He's got a gal, wants to be a flight instructor--some days I sit back and go, is this really my son? And was I ever that young?"  
Steve laughs. "You were, I can testify to that."  
"Crazy to think about. Anyway, what about you? Don't tell me you settled down?" Gabe asks. "Not you."

His tone--implying that he knows exactly why Steve doesn't have some girl on his arm--annoys Steve, but he smooths his temper down at once. Captain America doesn't flip his lid so easily.

"Got a boy," he says easily, cracking another smile. "My godson, Tony."  
"The Stark kid," Gabe remembers. "The one who put the stars in your sky. Still playing parent?"  
Steve shrugs. "Someone's gotta do it."

"Ah--the Steve Rogers mantra. I sure haven't missed that one," Gabe says. "Still, it's good to see you. We lost Jacques two years ago, did you hear?"  
"I heard," Steve says, reaching out to clap Gabe's shoulder again. "I meant to make it to the funeral, I just . . ."  
"I know," Gabe says, relieving him of the need to explain. "Nobody blamed you, Cap. Not after . . ."

Bucky. The name sits between them like an ugly duckling, fluffed and fat and not even close to transforming into something beautiful.

"I'm sorry," Gabe says.

"You don't have to--"

"I'm not sorry for the reason you think," his old friend interrupts. "I'm sorry because we all knew what was going on, and none of us saw fit to let you know that. We could have intervened, or given our blessing, or done something other than stand by. Now I've wanted to say that for almost forty years, and I finally have, and that's the end of it."

He shakes Steve's hand off and starts towards the gates of the school. Halfway there, he turns around as if remembering something else, and points at Steve. "You aren't fucked up, Rogers. Not any more than the rest of us, anyway. You loved that man and you did your best." He lowers his arm. "I'm going in now--see you at the brunch tomorrow. Don't get into too much trouble." He chuckles, and disappears into the school grounds, hobbling a little but still the same Gabe Jones.

Steve feels sick.  
But also, strangely, he feels better.  
He feels better for approximately ten minutes, a rough estimate of how long it takes him to cross the campus, make sense of the Welcome Visitors map, and find his way to Tony's dorm.

And then he walks in on Tony sucking off some boy, and better evaporates.

He's frozen with his hand on the doorknob, one foot still raised to go over the threshold of the room.  
The unknown boy is sitting on one of the two beds in the room, eyes closed, one hand bracing himself and the other running through Tony's hair. His khaki shorts are down around his ankles, Tony's head bobbing between his knees.

It's only a few seconds, but it's the longest few seconds of Steve's life. Whatever else Tony's been, he's always been Steve's first and foremost; maybe not his child, but something like that. Something that belonged to him.  
And this kid--this guy who snaps open dark brown eyes and barks, "Tony!" like he supernaturally sensed Steve's presence--has no business treading in Steve's territory.

"Wha--" Tony's head snaps back as he's abruptly shoved away from the other guy, and he tumbles back on his heels, swearing. "What the fuck, Rhodes?" he snaps.  
"What is going on?" Steve rumbles, unable to keep the anger from his voice. "This is what you've been doing? Wasting Howard's money on the chance to suck off some black whore?"  
"Dude," Tony's roommate--Rhodes--says at once. "Not cool. Jesus, where have you been for the last--"

Tony springs to his feet, ignoring him. "What are you doing here?" he demands.  
"You invited me!"  
"You weren't supposed to show up until two!"  
"That makes it okay to--to--to--" Steve gestures at Rhodes. "What the hell, Tony? What were you just doing?"

Tony runs his thumb over the corner of his lip, his eyes icing over. "Pretty sure it was obvious, Cap."  
"What's the matter with you?!"  
Tony looks away, then back at Steve, and then laughs. "What, so I can only fuck around if it's with you?"

"Uh--whoa--" Rhodes says, yanking his pants back up. His expression clearly spells out his reluctance to be involved in this. "Tony, should I go?"  
"Yes," Steve says.  
"No," Tony counters.

"You can't fuck around at all," Steve snaps at Tony.  
"Beach house in Malibu says differently."  
"That was a mistake."  
"Like hell that was a mistake." Tony flips his hand dismissively. "Welcome to the open house."  
"Don't try to pretend nothing just happened!"  
"What? Isn't that what we do?" Tony demands. "That's how this family works--pretend the nasty shit doesn't happen! Cover it all up and smile." He pastes a grimace on his face.

"What the fuck is the matter with you?"  
"Ladies and gentlemen, the million dollar question."

"Seriously, I'm going to go," Rhodes says, edging for the door, which Steve is blocking. "You guys work out--"

"There's nothing to work out," Steve cuts him off. "I'm leaving, Tony. And I'm telling your father about your behavior."  
"Don't you fucking dare!" Tony shrieks.  
"Isn't that what you want?!" Steve shoots back. "For Howard to finally give a damn about you? Well, I exist to give you what you want, Tony, and I guarantee he'll give a damn when he finds out what you've been doing!"

"FUCK YOU!"

Steve whips out of the dorm, blood pounding through his head, burning his veins, his chest heaving with the effort of not throwing Tony into a wall. He's too pissed to see straight, and he almost runs into more than one concerned parent on his way out.

  
The picture--the terrible picture--of Tony's head between someone's legs stays burned in his mind. The good thing about his anger is that it's impossible to feel anything else while it's slamming against his chest to the beat of his furious heart, so he doesn't start in on the hurt, despair, or confusion until he's found his way to a lake somewhere on the grounds, nowhere near the taxi pickup he intended to reach.

  
"FUCK!" he screams out over the water, stamping his feet. "FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!"

  
The anger has nowhere to go; it paces restlessly around his chest, roars through the words, then sulkily retreats once it realizes there's nothing to pound to dust in frustration.  
Steve collapses to his knees.

  
What does he do? What is he supposed to do? What just happened . . . and why?

  
It had to have been on purpose. Tony knew Steve took an earlier flight, he knew perfectly well that Steve would be there before two because Steve was always early and this was nothing new. Tony grew up with Steve; he just knew these things, didn't have to be told.

  
Some part of him had to have known he'd be caught.

  
And to be caught doing--to be caught like that. It was intentional. Steve knows Tony enough to know that.  
Steve looks at the sky, as if gravity can prevent his tears from leaking out. He isn't a crier; after a few deep breaths, the urge to sob goes away. But the hopeless feeling remains, nestled there and whispering savage little comments like how hypocritical Steve is being right now, how pathetic, how terrible.

  
"You are a fucking mess, man," someone says.

  
Steve jerks his head up. It's the kid from before--Rhodes. Steve's on his feet in an instant, fists clenched, ready to deck a fifteen-year-old.  
The boy holds up both hands. "Woah, woah--slow down there, Cap. We know that wouldn't be a fair fight."

  
"What do you want?" Steve demands.

  
"Look, obviously you have no idea who I am," Rhodes says. "But for the past seven months, all I've heard is 'Captain America' this and 'Steve Rogers' that." He pauses. "Tony thinks you're some kind of god, so even though I think you're being an asshole, I'm going to say this anyway, and that's that Tony--my best friend--needs your help. He's hurting, he's always hurting, and there's jack shit I can do about it. So if you can stop it--if you can fix whatever the hell has him acting so shitty--then do it. Don't just yell at him for stupid shit and then run away."

  
"Are you--" Steve has to take another steadying breath. "Are you--the child I just caught my godson sucking off--seriously telling me what to do right now?"  
Rhodes lifts his chin, setting his jaw. "Yeah," he says. "And if you don't go back in there, apologize to Tony, and fucking fix him, I'm going to tell every news outlet and tabloid that will listen that you called a Senator's son a 'black whore'." He levels Steve with a determined look. "I just want to help my friend. I know you'll do the right thing, sir."

* * *

 

 

When Tony was three years old, he tried to eat a firecracker on the Fourth of July. Steve still remembers how panicked he felt as he yanked the explosive out of the toddler's mouth; it was the first time he'd been scared enough to lose his bearings, surroundings vanishing with the intensity of the emotion. He'd dropped to the ground, clutching the wriggling kid against his chest for longer than Tony liked, and hadn't let go until the boy started to wail.

  
Steve hadn't realized then that he'd gotten himself into something he couldn't walk away from. All he knew was that the center of his universe had nearly shorted out, and those few seconds without gravity had left his head spinning.

  
He stands outside the door to Tony's dorm room now, a similar feeling of loss curling in the pit of his stomach. This time, the sensation is coupled with an unfounded sense of betrayal. He knows Tony doesn't owe him anything--but it still hurts. He's still hurt.

  
Tony yanks open the door. "I can hear you breathing," he snaps. "What the fuck do you want?"

  
"What the f--" Steve stops, forcing the angry words back. He needs to be an adult, in this if nothing else. "What I want," he says, with deliberate care, "is to know what you were thinking."

  
He digs in his pockets and pulls out his wallet, flipping it open impatiently to yank out a small, square package that he shakes at Tony. "First, this is 1985, Tony, people are dying of AIDS and you will use a condom. Don't give me that shocked face--even in the war we used these." He twitches his fingers, flicking the package at the boy, who flinches.

  
"Second, you are fifteen years old. You are in school. The best possible outcome if you are caught is expulsion--the worst is that you are tried as an adult, convicted of gross sexual conduct and crimes against nature, sent to jail for a minimum of five years and branded as a sex offender for the rest of your life, which is a long time considering that--did I mention this?--you're fifteen." Steve takes a breath.

  
Tony opens his mouth.

  
"Stop right there," Steve orders. "I'm not done. Before you delightfully remind me that I'm not your father and have no say in what you do, let _me_ remind _you_ that I am the only person who gives a damn whether you grow up well; that's why I'm here, that's why I took time to come to your school's open house despite wanting to be just about anywhere else on earth. So if you did this to get back at me for what I did--for the mistake I made with you--or to try to stir up some kind of reaction, or to get me to abandon you, I'm sorry but it's not going to work. I am not going anywhere. Suck it up, soldier."

  
Tony crosses his arms. "Are you done?"

  
"I'm done."

  
"Good. Now get in here." Tony grabs his collar and yanks him inside, slamming the door behind them.

  
"What are you doing?" Steve's thrown off-guard. He was expecting more yelling, or a sulky silence, or maybe a couple of middle fingers . . . not whatever's happening right now.  
Tony holds up the condom. "You told me to use this. I'm using it." He unbuckles his pants, shoving them down to his ankles. His belt clinks against the floor. "I'll suck it up once you suck me off."

  
"What?" Steve's eyes widen. He can't have heard correctly.

  
"Suck me off," Tony repeats. "Now." He waves the silver-foiled package at Steve. "Y'know, to show me how to properly use a rubber. Think of it as a teaching moment."  
"I can't--"  
"Oh, please, you've got a woody just thinking about it," Tony scoffs, gesturing to Steve's tightening jeans. "Get on your knees."  
"Tony--"  
"Get on. Your fucking. Knees." Tony shoves him in the chest. He isn't strong enough to budge Steve, but the intent alone has Steve's knees hitting the floor.

  
This is bad. This is so bad. Steve wasn't thinking before, wasn't considering exactly how fucked over he was, but while he was laying down the law for Tony he realized he should be applying those arguments to himself. Things have changed since the war; they haven't changed that much. Men like Steve are still monsters, just monsters wearing different faces, doing better jobs of hiding it.

  
Tony palms himself over his underwear, as if psyching himself up. "C'mon, Rogers," he says, in that half-adult husky voice, low with the unrestrained lust of teenagers. "It's my turn, and you'd better fucking blow me."

  
"Tony--"

  
"Lick my head," Tony whispers, hands moving mechanically, rhythmically massaging the bulge in his briefs. His chin is tilted up, and Steve can follow the line of his body up to his ear, every inch of it quivering with anticipation. But for all that, Tony's face is calm, eyes hooded, breath controlled.

  
"I want to feel your tongue, want it to slide down my cock," Tony says, damn mouth spilling damnable words, "lap my balls like a fucking dog, and let me thrust into your face so hard you're seeing my dick on the other side of your head." He pulls the band of his underwear down, just enough to slip out his cock, cradling it in one hand. "So hard you forget you ever saw anything else."

  
Steve braces his hands on his knees, though standing is the last thing on his mind. His eyes are fixed on Tony's hips, rotating ever so subtly, Tony's fingers kneading his own cock, his breath shallow now. He's close enough to catch the musky scent off Tony's balls and a shudder goes through him.

  
The part of his mind that's forever in that tent with Bucky wakes up, prods him into action, and as Tony nudges his tip encouragingly against Steve's lips, the world falls away.  
He slips one hand between Tony's legs, resting his fingers against the soft skin under Tony's dick, his pinky digging into Tony's thigh, and opens his mouth obediently.  
"Fuck," Tony exhales, and Steve rests his other hand on the boy's ass, using it to control Tony's slow, steady pumps.

  
He swirls his tongue around Tony's head, just like the boy said he would, and closes his lips around Tony's shaft before pulling back. He's not licking anyone's balls, but he gently massages Tony's with his palm.

  
Slow. Torturous. Beautiful. Steve knows how to do this, knows how to look for the tells of Tony's arousal. He takes Tony's dick into his mouth again, working his jaw carefully up and down, his own hips rolling with expectation. He is hard with the very idea of what he's doing.

  
He runs his tongue over the head again, and starts to bob his head forwards and back, hands moving in time to the tentative thrusts of Tony's hips. He encourages the movement, rocking Tony's body against him, breathing hitching when Tony speeds up the pace.

  
"Ah--" Tony gasps, and Steve sits back, licking the taste of the boy's pre-cum off his lips. The look on Tony's face as he stops is priceless.  
Steve slips the condom out of Tony's hand and waves it at him in reminder, then tears it open.

  
"Proper protection," he begins, as if giving a lecture in a completely innocuous situation, "is essential for both you and your partner. There are, of course, schools of thought that believe condoms aren't necessary in oral sex." He slips the small rubber out of its package. "But you know me. Better safe than sorry. Now, if I was certain you haven't been sticking that pretty little thing--and I do mean little--into anyone else, I might not be so fussy."

  
He lines up Tony's dick with the center of the condom, suppressing a smile at the dying hard-on. "Now, pragmatics," he goes on, and Tony groans. "It's easier to get on once you're 'up', if you catch my meaning, so a little foreplay is to be expected--just don't forget to put it on once you've started." At Tony's beleaguered look, he adds, "You were the one who made it a lesson. Also, sizing is important--I'd suggest something mid-range for you, don't get cocky and buy Super Max. Too small and the condom breaks; too big and it doesn't do its job."

  
He eases the condom onto Tony's cock, rolling the rubber down to his base, and circles the loose rubber with one hand. "This," he breathes, "is too big. But that's alright--I'll help you out this time."

  
Holding the condom in place, he goes back to teasing Tony's head, this time with a little more force, and Tony obligingly gasps and groans at the right places. He staggers backwards, falling onto the bed, and Steve follows, crawling on his knees and then climbing up, starting to coax Tony along from the base up this time.

  
Where he is, with his torso on the bed and knees still on the floor, presses his own dick against the side of the mattress, and the pressure is too tempting to not take advantage of. He starts to slowly rub against the bed, the friction encouraging him to put even more enthusiasm into his sucking.

  
"Damn--" Tony groans. "Steve--fuck--ahh--" His mouth opens and closes, but no more sound comes out.

  
Steve tamps down a grin, his whole body rocking now. His mouth is full of Tony, tongue soaked with salty sweat. The head of Tony's dick teases the back of his throat, tempting his gag reflex, somehow turning him on even more. The slight, sterile taste of latex isn't enough to dissuade him; it's easier to maintain his rhythm this way. He can still feel the ridges of Tony's skin through the plastic, the blood pulsing under it.

  
His own dick is throbbing, his heart rate speeding up with every hitch of Tony's breath. The bed feels nice, but his head keeps picturing other things; Tony's mouth, his asshole, his hand, transformed from body parts to outlets for Steve's sexual desire.

  
In the back of his mind he knows this isn't right, but he's being used right now, as surely as he's using Tony in his head, and somehow that makes it all fair. He frees a hand to reach down and unzip his pants, struggling to hold two different strokes now. His dick is damp already, twitching, and nothing feels better in the world right now than yanking it, far more savagely than the treatment he's giving Tony.

  
Tony's breath is coming shorter and shorter, the sounds driving Steve to pump faster, to accelerate his own jerking off. Good, good, good, good, the word thumps in time to his beat, bed creaking in what would be a laughably graphic way if he weren't more concerned with the growing heat in his belly, the tingling rising in the back of his throat, the way this couldn't feel any more good, the damnably passive word to describe the tide cresting over him.

  
He's moving wildly, chasing that pleasure, thoughts going in a thousand different directions, and Tony's bucking underneath him, chanting, "Cumming--cumming--cumming--" and when his whole body goes rigid, dick swelling in Steve's mouth, juddering and tickling that spot in the back of his throat again, Steve explodes.

  
Every muscle in his body seizes up, and his head jerks up, Tony's dick slipping from his mouth, a strained cry ripped from his throat. He's never cum so violently before, and knowing that Tony's a witness to it makes the feeling that much more intense. He crests-crests-highs--and slowly, slowly coasts back down, leaving the bubble of orgasm in time to hear Tony say, "You were jerking off? You perv."

  
His heart is thudding like crazy. He doesn't remember the last time he was out of breath--Steve Rogers doesn't get out of breath. He's Captain America.  
He's _Captain America_.  
This time, there's no waiting period for the guilt. It slams into him as quickly as his orgasm did, only this feeling isn't pleasant.  
He stares at his soaked hands, at the translucent fluid running down the side of Tony's sheets.

  
"How do I take this thing off?" Tony asks, picking at the condom.  
"I--" Steve says shakily, getting to his feet. He shoves himself back into his jeans, grimacing at the just-wet-my-pants sensation. "I--I have to go, Tony, I have to go, I can't--"  
"Just tell me how to get the fucking condom off," Tony snaps. "I don't want to get jizz everywhere."  
"I shouldn't have--"

  
"Oh, fuck you," the boy groans, and clumsily yanks the rubber off. It pulls on his damp skin and rolls like a wet sock, and he pulls a face. Still, he manages to keep things more or less neat. "You knot it, right? Like a balloon?" He glances at Steve. "Fucking useless prick."

  
Steve runs his hand over his hair, spinning around, looking for an exit. He catches sight of a bottle of alcohol on Tony's dresser; no; pretends he didn't see.  
His chest aches. The afterglow warms his belly and abdomen, and his knees feel weak, but his brain is in a panic. How could he have done this? Again?

  
_This is who you are_ , Bucky-in-his-head taunts him. _Can't change it, Steve-o. This is always who you're going to be. Filthy slut, ruled by his dick. I told you, didn't I? Warned you. You just didn't listen_.

  
He hasn't had an asthma attack in decades, but he almost could now. That's what this feels like. The air protests on its way to his lungs, doubling back and tangling up; his limbs are shaking.  
"I--have to go--" he stammers, and stumbles out.

  
Rhodes is standing in the hall, arms folded over his striped polo. "You didn't fix him," he states, rather than asks. There's no mistaking the condemning look on his face. "Do Tony a favor, then, Cap. Get out of his life. If I wanted him to face-fuck someone I would have done it myself."


	6. July 1985

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING--NONCON--UNDERAGED

Steve hands Tony a bomb pop, then collapses in the folding chair he set up next to his front step. Tony's Birks rest on the sidewalk, his bare feet curled up under his thighs. He presses the wrapped popsicle to his forehead, fighting the stifling heat that drove them from the apartment. 

"Never thought I'd miss the family mansion," he gripes, eyeing Steve's Orange Creamsicle covetously. "At least they have air conditioning. And don't tell me you don't make enough to afford it because I've seen your tax statements. The VA's done right by you, Rogers."

Steve ignores the teenager's complaints, unwrapping his frozen treat and sticking it in his mouth. The cold is a relief; this heat reminds him too much of old Brooklyn, of the world when air was his enemy and consumption prowled the cramped streets like a cat on the hunt. He's been through hell and back since then, but that doesn't mean he's forgotten. Some days, the memories of Red Hook seem more vivid than anything happening in front of his eyes. 

Tony has his heart-shaped sunglasses on again, which reminds Steve of Malibu, and he's tied his t-shirt around his hair in lieu of wearing it. He's either unaware of his own appeal, or he plain doesn't care; Steve's guessing the latter. His skin's darker than it was, even when Steve visited in June, and if the weather continues like this, he'll have a real tan soon.

Steve looks at his hands. He's been trying not to think about June, about what he did, but it still keeps him up at night. He can't believe Tony elected to come here. He certainly doesn't understand why. 

"Are you--" he starts, unsure how the boy will take the question, "Are you okay, Tony?"

"Who? Me?" Tony tears open the bomb pop. "Just peachy. Never been better. Got an A on my Chemistry final. I'm enrolling in MIT this fall."

"What?" Startled, Steve turns to face him, the plastic ties of the chair creaking in protest. "But you're a freshman in high school."

Tony shrugs. "I tested out of my classes."

"For the year?"

"For my remaining three years." Tony rolls his eyes. "It wasn't hard. I studied throughout the semester. I was going to tell you on Spring Break, but . . ." he trails off, and looks down. It's the closest he's come to mentioning what happened. He lets the sentence hang.

"But--how could you--but--why?" Steve demands. "What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking that I can't sit around, waiting for you to rescue me," Tony snaps. "If I'm going to get out of Howard's house, it's going to be under my own steam. I get that now." He swabs his pop through his mouth savagely, biting off the blue tip as he yanks it away from his lips. 

Steve doesn't know what to say to that.

"Is . . . can I help at all?" he asks, clumsy. Awkward. Useless. He licks his Creamsicle, the flavor only registering dimly in the back of his mind. 

Tony shakes his head. 

"Seriously," Steve presses. "If there's anything I can--"

"Don't worry about it," Tony cuts him off. "Not your kid, not your problem."

Steve sighs. "You've always been my problem, Tony."

"Well then, you don't have to worry about me bothering you any more!" Tony exclaims. He shoves his feet back into his sandals and gets up, climbing the steps.

"Oh, come on--" Steve starts, as the screen door slams behind the boy. "Real mature!" he yells after Tony. "Way to deal with your problems like an adult!"

He catches a flash of Tony's middle finger before the boy disappears into the bowels of the apartment, and when he stands up to give chase, he notices more than a few onlookers on the street. 

He can see the headlines now: _Captain America fights with Teenage Lover!_

He stalks inside, squashing the paranoia before it can start up. His relationship with Tony has been peppered through the tabloids since the first leaked picture of him holding the baby in the hospital--speculations have run rampant ever since, from Steve being Tony's real father to the boy being groomed to take his place as the next Captain America. The gossip rags, critical as they are, never get anything right. 

He guesses that's lucky for him.

"Tony!" he shouts, going through the kitchen. Tony isn't in there, or the living room. He goes down the hall, checks his bedroom, then Tony's. No dice. That only leaves one place.

He raps on the bathroom door. "Tony," he repeats. "You're smart, you know what I meant to say."

"Stop telling me I'm smart!" Tony yells through the door. "I already know that, I don't need you to remind me! I'm smart, I don't play well with others, I'm socially maladjusted, I don't really give a fuck!" 

It sounds like he's been told this before.

Steve sighs, and tries the knob. It turns easily, so he stops yelling like a maniac and lets himself in.

Tony's leaning on the sink, bare shoulderblades jutting out from his back like stubby wings. His face doesn't look fifteen; it doesn't even look like a child's anymore. He looks exhausted. He's yanked his t-shirt off his head and thrown it in the corner.

Steve closes the distance between them in a few steps and rests his hands on the sink, boxing Tony in. He sets his chin on Tony's shoulder, looking at the two of them in the mirror. Tony's dark eyes are accusatory, pained--something in his expression makes Steve's stomach twinge. He looks too old.

He covers the boy's hands with his own. 

"I have to get out of there," Tony whispers. "Do you understand, Steve? It's driving me crazy. I can't stay any longer, and if you won't take me . . ."

Steve kisses his temple. "I can't. You know why I can't."

"I know why you can't, but then you say things like I'll always be your problem and it's confusing, do you want me to go or stay?" The words bubble out of Tony like Steve's words hit just the right spot to break the water main of his thoughts. "Do you want to fuck me or be a parent, because you can't be both, and is taking care of me the same as fixing me? Rhodey wants you to fix me but I didn't realize--I didn't think I was broken."

"You aren't," Steve assures him.

"Well _something's_ fucking wrong with me." 

"I know." Steve kisses him again, this time on the cheek. "Something's wrong with me, too."

Tony turns his head, catching Steve on the lips, and his hands go behind Steve's head to yank him down for a real kiss. Their bodies press together, and Steve finally puts his hands on Tony's bare skin, runs them over the boy's back and chest, dancing his fingers along the band of Tony's shorts. 

He's more caught up in the sensation of Tony's skin under his than anything else; despite the sticky heat, his hands slide easily over Tony's ribs, and he picks out each one with his fingers, runs his palms over Tony's chest and grabs his shoulders, pulling the boy's body closer. He can hear Tony's heavy breathing in the small space between them. 

He thrusts his tongue into Tony's mouth, absorbed in the feeling, and Tony seizes his waist, squeezing him tightly, his own tongue flattening to make room for Steve's.  
They kiss for--Steve doesn't know how long--he's lost in the steady pattern of mouthing and breathing and lapping his tongue against Tony's--and then he breaks away, realizing his fingers are playing with the hem of Tony's shorts.

"More," Tony breathes, reaching for him.

"No." Steve has to close his eyes, to block out Tony's fuckable face with its swollen lips and slanted eyebrows, and push himself away. "No, I shouldn't . . ."

"But--" 

"I can't," Steve corrects. "It's not fair to you." He backs up, turning his eyes away from Tony because he can't look at him and resist, and he has to resist, because he can't touch Tony like he wants to. It isn't right. 

Captain America doesn't fuck teenagers. Or males. 

_You keep telling yourself that_ , Bucky taunts, and Steve bites his lip.

"What are you talking about? I do this all the time," Tony scoffs, arms folded self-consciously over his chest, lips still swelled red from Steve's kiss.

Steve's sense of possession rears its ugly head as he considers the idea of Tony having sex with someone else. Rhodes pops to mind; the swell of anger and jealousy is instantaneous, and he whirls on Tony.

"How many people are you sleeping with?" he demands, aware that he's baring his teeth like a damn animal, that he probably looks a lot like Bucky right now, that the apple doesn't fall far from the steely-eyed, paranoid tree.

Tony slips away from the sink, expression contorting with annoyance. "That's none of your business."

"More than me and the Rhodes kid?"

"Steve--"

"Are you sleeping around?" Steve presses, blocking Tony from the door. "Answer me."

"No!" Tony snaps, shoving his chest. It does exactly nothing. "Fuck off!"

"Are you sleeping around?" Steve repeats, moving closer, aware that he can still tower over Tony when need be. "Tony."

"Stop!" 

"Then give me an answer! How many people are you having sex with?!" Steve snaps. "Is this a thing for you, now--you're feeling bad so you grab the first body around to screw around with? Is that what you're doing? Because I know that kind of behavior, and it doesn't fix anything, it just turns you into a slut!"

"Shut the fuck up! If you aren't game then just let me go!" Tony snarls. 

"This is a problem," Steve tells him, taking another step closer. 

"Oh, that took you," Tony checks an imaginary watch, "five seconds to do a heel-face turn and become exactly like everyone else. Get off my back, Rogers!"

Steve seizes his wrist, yanking it away from his face, and Tony tilts his head up defiantly, glaring. 

"Fuck you gonna do to me?" he taunts. "Break my balls so I can't fuck anyone else?"

"This isn't how you should act," Steve growls.

"Howard does it."

"Howard's in his fifties and he isn't you!" 

"I _am_ my father!" Tony screams in his face. "Everything I am, everything I have, belongs to him! That makes me his, that makes me him! That's why you won't take me, because I belong to fucking Howard!"

"I won't take you because you're a child!" Steve yells back.

"I'm NOT!" 

Anger flares through Steve, the rebellious look on Tony's face hitting him straight in the pride. Tony isn't Howard's, he's Steve's, and he's supposed to do what Steve says. He isn't supposed to be like this--he isn't supposed to be Steve, because that's whose face stares back at him, not Howard's, but his own. His own damn stubbornness when he was Tony's age. 

Tony wants to be an adult?

Fine. 

"You want me to have you?" Steve growls. "Fine."

Tony opens his mouth, but Steve's there before he can say a word, slamming his palm against Tony's jaw, clamping his mouth shut.

"Shut up," he hisses, shoving Tony against the wall with that hand while he fumbles with his shorts with the other. He gets the button undone, fingers shaking with anticipation and dread; it's as though he's just a spectator, some other being controlling his body, but he knows better. This is him. This is the culmination of what he started in April, when he kissed Tony like a fool and thought he could be better than his predecessors.

He can't.

He grabs Tony's crotch, kneading his balls through those damn dolphin shorts, and flicks his eyes over Tony's slim body. 

He hooks a thumb under Tony's waistband and yanks the shorts down, ignoring the rip of fabric as he does so, and goes back to fondling Tony, this time skin against skin. 

His cock perks up with interest, his hands taking in the quivering, slightly sweaty body that's his to play with. 

His expression must be terrible, because Tony doesn't look cocky anymore. He almost looks scared.

"I won't stop," Steve promises. "Even if you're frightened. Even if you cry. Because adults don't stop, Tony. Adults don't care about other people's feelings."

He hears Bucky in his words, and his stomach lurches.

He rests his forehead against Tony's, his hand between them. "You're lucky. We're in a bathroom and you're lucky, because if we weren't in a bathroom this would hurt a lot more. But I wouldn't do anything to make you feel better, because adults don't do that." 

He reaches out with his free hand, grabbing a few things that aren't what he's looking for and throwing them aside.

Tony isn't fighting back, but his body is shaking. His eyes are wide, chest heaving with shallow breaths. 

Steve finds his bottle of lotion and holds in against his body, awkwardly pumping too much into his hand before letting the bottle join the shampoo and aftershave on the floor. "This'll be cold," he says, almost cheerful. "I don't expect you'll enjoy it. And, oh dear, we don't have a condom. Too bad." 

Tony's eyebrows slant down sharply; he yells something, but it's muffled against Steve's palm and all it accomplishes is Steve holding him more firmly against the wall. He's acutely aware that he could crush Tony's skull if he isn't careful.

His dick is twitching in anticipation, semi-hard even before he slicks lotion on it. He reaches between Tony's legs, smearing lotion around clumsily until he finds Tony's asshole.

The squeak that comes out of Tony when Steve finds it and forces a finger inside is enough to send a ripple of desire through Steve's body. He can feel it rising in the back of his throat, a craving, an old longing he never quite forgot, his nerves prickling with excitement. 

It's easy to lift Tony up, to work more fingers inside him despite the increasing noises of discomfort Tony's making. He rubs his fingers along the wall of the boy's rectum, mimicking the motion of a dick inside it, though on a smaller scale.

"Don't tense up," he teases. "Relax."

Whatever Tony was going to angrily declare, it's blocked by Steve's hand. 

"Okay, count of three," Steve breathes, fighting a smile at the look in Tony's eyes--a mixture of murder and terror and hatred, and that's good, that's what he was going for--and without counting, he lowers Tony and pushes into him. He has to take his hand from Tony's mouth to support him, and as soon as he does, Tony screams.

"FUCK YOU FUCK FUCK _FUCK_ THAT HURTS!"

He's tight inside, so tight Steve can hardly believe it was this easy to get inside him, and his cock brushes Steve's stomach tantalizingly. 

His own dick is being constricted, squeezed, and when he begins to move--damn. Blocking out Tony's outraged whimpers, Steve first nudges, then massages, then pounds Tony against the wall, distantly aware of the somewhat ironic sound of banging. 

"This is what you wanted," he mutters to Tony. "Still think it's a good idea?"

Tony's face is twisted up in pain, fists beating uselessly at Steve's shoulders. "Take it out."

"I warned you."

Steve doesn't stop. He increases the pace, ignores the boy, thinks only about the feeling of his cock inside Tony, the muscles of Tony's opening contracting around his shaft more tightly than a hand could, his tip nudging a wall of muscle--he spreads his legs wider, holding Tony's thigh over his own, forcing himself in deeper. 

Just as he promised, even when Tony starts to cry he doesn't stop.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't tell you guys where this chapter came from. Hell, maybe.


	7. September 1985

Howard is, of course, beside himself.

"A museum," he exclaims, stuffing the brochure in his suit pocket and whirling around like a child. It's been a while since Steve's been out with Howard in public; he's forgotten how the man gets. "A museum, all to my achievement!"

"To Captain America," Steve corrects, not because he wants the glory for himself but because Howard's head needs deflating on an hourly basis. 

"Who is my creation!" Howard practically skips past the admittance desk. Steve hasn't seen him this happy since Nixon was elected. "This is incredible, Steve-o. It's amazing. It's beyond amazing. It's a dream come true."

Steve follows him, but without the hopping and manic grinning. He hadn't asked for a museum in his name; it seems kind of tacky, if he's honest. Museums are for dead people, and he isn't. That's kind of the irony of his entire life: that he's not dead. 

There's a timeline of his life painted on the wall of the first room; it snakes around and ends by the door, next to a framed photo of him in the "modern age". He wishes someone had reminded the designers that all ages were modern to him.

He trails after Howard through the exhibits, torn between boredom and morbid fascination as he reads exactly what the American people think of him. There are replicas of his old weapons and uniform, displays with copies of Howard's research, little diagrams that break the serum's effects down into happy, simple cartoons, a whole room dedicated to his hobbies (apparently his habit of buying from thrift shops is now called "antiquing" instead of "penny pinching"), and so much more, and it's an out-of-body-experience, because it's his life, but it's also not. He knows these things happened to him, but reading about them from a plaque makes it feel like they didn't. 

Little things bug him. He met Peggy in the fall of 1940, not the spring of '41. His men wore American flag pins, sure, but on their rucksacks or stocking caps, not right on their uniform--that was a breach of dress code. Dum-Dum Dugan's hair was red, flaming red, not that cherry auburn on the mannequin. 

He's so distracted, pointing out the inaccuracies in his head, that he doesn't notice he's lost Howard until he comes to a room that has no one else in it. 

He peeks back the way he came; no Howard. Remembering the time he lost track of the man in a Mini Mart (didn't end well), he heads for the next exhibit, figuring Howard must have just gotten too far ahead. About halfway through the room, though, he stops. 

The room, all navy blue carpet and black walls, is a memorial. He's seen enough of them to kick himself for not noticing the somber atmosphere and simplified displays earlier. 

There are three glass partitions set at angles in the room, and the walls are bare except for a rifle hanging to Steve's left, a small paragraph in silver next to it. He can guess what it says before he even approaches it.

_M1941 Johnston Rifle, carried by sharpshooter James Buchanan "Bucky" Barnes, c. 1942. Special thanks to the Barnes Foundation for the preservation of this weapon._

And suddenly, he's everywhere--Bucky.

Bucky with his stupid loud voice and cocky smirk and those long fingers that took apart the Johnston and put it back together, every night in the tent they shared. Bucky who started fucking Steve when he was twelve and never stopped, not until he died. 

Steve stares up at the rifle as if it's a shrine, his hands clenching and unclenching mechanically. Seeing the rifle again is like seeing Bucky's face, hearing his voice, feeling his fingers scrape over filthy skin. Even when Steve grew big and strong and invincible, Bucky still had a hold over him. And like Gabe said, everyone in the unit noticed but no one did a damn thing about it.

"It's not good, it's not bad," he whispers to himself, reaching up to touch the rifle. "It's just what happened."

The weapon is smooth and cold, held up by only two hooks. It would be so simple to take it.

Steve lowers his hand. He doesn't want it, of course he doesn't want it. Bucky's gone, and no rifle will bring him back, and whatever happened between him and Steve in the past, done and over and there's no sense thinking about it, even if he's still divided six ways from Sunday about the the affair. 

He pivots, coming face to face with the last glass partition. It's etched with a five foot tall picture of Bucky's face, and Steve's stomach lurches.

He takes a sharp breath, his heart throbbing as a wave of nausea passes over him. He wants to punch the damn thing, shatter it into a thousand minuscule pieces until there's nothing left to this fucking joke of a memorial--  
\--and he loves Bucky, he loves him so much and he misses him more than anything in the world because Bucky was his world, before Tony anyway--  
\--and his cheeks burn with shame as he remembers the things Bucky used to do--  
\--and, like someone just threw a bucket of ice water on him, he snaps out of the emotional spiral to realize that his fingernails are digging deep enough into his palms to bleed. He still feels a little sick, as if moving too quickly will make him throw up. Bucky's face stares impassively back at him, wearing that same moody expression he got right before he drove Steve into the woods; shoved his face in the dirt and--

Steve shakes his head violently, ignoring the bile rising in his throat. He fills his head with better memories, of shared milkshakes and the funny little smile Bucky only gave Steve, and the weight of Bucky's arm over his shoulder and how the universe really only felt right when they were walking down Coffey Street together like that. 

He sits, more because it takes too much concentration to stand than anything else, crossing his legs, inches from the tableau. He rests his forehead on the memorial, the etched glass rough on his skin. He takes deep breaths so he won't actually blow chunks. 

This knot of confused feelings . . . this terrible mix of love and hate and nausea and shame and longing . . . it's the worst thing in the world. How could Bucky, who claimed to love him, subject him to this? How could Bucky _do_ this to him?

His breath catches. What if he's done it to Tony? What if, when Tony thinks of Steve, all he can think of is Steve driving him into a mattress or slamming him against the bathroom wall--what if Tony can't remember the good things anymore, what if all the awful things Steve did ruined all of Tony's nice memories, like how Steve can't remember building blanket forts with Bucky without also remembering what they did in the fort that Bucky made him swear not to tell to anyone else, double-pinky-swear on his mother's grave and everything?

Steve closes his eyes. Tony's life isn't his, he reminds himself. That's the whole point--that's what he's been working for since the first moment he held Howard's baby in his arms. Tony's life is going to be better than Steve's; Tony's not going to have breakdowns at Captain America museums or grow up thinking love and sex are twin shameful things to be kept in the dark. 

So Steve.

Steve knows what he has to do. And it's going to kill him, it's going to hurt more than humanly possible and at the end he might wish he was dead, but he's gotta do it.  
He reaches out and touches Bucky's cold face again.  
"I miss you," he whispers. "This is all your fault, because you died and left me and I miss you."

The cold is reassuring against his burning face, and he stays there for a long time, gathering his courage. He brings Tony's face into his mind, preserving the memories as he runs the pads of his fingers over the etched glass, his breath staining the memorial. He wants to melt into the glass, to stay there forever. Frozen. But that won't absolve him of his sins.

Howard finally comes looking for him.

"Steve," he says. "Steve, I found the gift shop. They sell plushies of you! _Plushies_!" He holds one out, waving its replica shield at Steve. When he notices his old friend doesn't so much as roll his eyes, he lowers the doll. "Steve? What's--"

He stops, looking up at the epitaph. "Oh."

"Howard," Steve says, hating the crack in his voice. "There's something I have to tell you. About Bucky . . . and Tony . . . and me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Steve tries but he's still really fucked up at the end of the day. We'll just blame Bucky. Thank you to everyone still reading!! It's winter break rn so I had time to edit the remaining chapters! And then after editing, I decided to change the ending, so! I really have no idea how long this is going to be. How should it end? I don't know. Should there be chapters from Tony's perspective? I don't know. Does Steve still love Bucky? Probably a little. Comment if you have answers for me!_


End file.
